After being thrown out of her beloved nationalist party SNS, Anna Belousovova must be heart-broken, but she says she will remain true to the party’s ideals nonetheless.
At a press conference today, Belousovova said she would not be giving up her MP mandate as requested by her former party colleagues, but instead would be an independent MP, supporting the SNS party policy from the outside.
When asked by the media if she would now be setting up her own party, Belousovova remained cautious, noting only that such an option was always open to her, and that anything was possible.
Belousovova did say, though, that she believes a true nationalist policy is absent on the Slovak political scene and that this could only be rectified either by reforming an existing party or by a new one being established.
She downplayed any possibility of her co-operating with the current coalition, saying that she had no choice but to continue supporting pro-national policy.
Belousovova also rejected the claims of her former party leadership that she had caused damage to the party’s goodwill, saying that she had only been critical after the party lost 7% of its voter support (about 140,000 votes), while demanding accountability for it. She put the loss down to the various scandals caused by the SNS while part of the former government, like the emission allowances deal and the ‘notice-board’ tender.
On the subject of her love-hate relationship with SNS leader Jan Slota, she said he is a thing of the past for her now, but that he is nether a friend nor foe. Before Belousovova was ejected from the SNS, Slota had said that it would be a mistake to throw her out and he didn’t show up for the announcement either.
The nationalists tend to stick together, though, seeing strength in numbers as the Slovak political scene is not big enough for two nationalist parties. This was shown once before when the party fractured, with Belousovova and Slota both heading their own parties until they realised that they were cutting each others throats. A reunion soon followed, with past grudges forgotten.
Belousovova claims that some MPs from the SNS are on her side and that they might openly declare it soon. If Belousovova does manage to get enough of the nationalists on her side, then we might just see a repeat of the situation from before.